RESEARCH REPORT CROSSING THE LINE Geopolitics and criminality at the India–Myanmar border PREM MAHADEVAN NOVEMBER 2020 CROSSING THE LINE CROSSING THE LINE Geopolitics and criminality at the India–Myanmar border ww Prem Mahadevan November 2020 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The author would like to thank Mark Shaw and Tuesday Reitano for invaluable feedback provided during the course of this research project. Thanks also to Mark Ronan and his team for a speedy and efficient editorial process. The author expresses gratitude to the Government of Norway for funding the research. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Before joining the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, Prem Mahadevan was a senior researcher with the Center for Security Studies at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. He specialized in research on organized crime, intelligence and irregular warfare. He has co-authored policy studies for the Swiss foreign ministry and written a book on counter-terrorist operations for the Indian Army. His academic publications include two books on intelligence and terrorism. © 2020 Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without permission in writing from the Global Initiative. Cover: View of the remote Zokhawthar–Rihkhawdar border crossing, a hotspot for the illicit smuggling of goods between India and Myanmar. © Eric Winny via Wikimedia Commons Design: Elné Potgieter Cartography: Rudi de Lange Please direct inquiries to: The Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime Avenue de France 23 Geneva, CH-1202 Switzerland www.globalinitiative.net CONTENTS Executive summary ����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 1 Scope of the report ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������3 The Northeast: a complex history and troubled political geography ��������������������������������������������������������� 5 Looking East: anaemic formal trade, thriving informal trade ������������������������������������������������������������������������ 11 Smuggling hotspots and flows �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 17 Illicit flows into India ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 18 Illicit flows out of India ��������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 22 Moreh: a portrait of a border town ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������25 Competition from Namphalong Market �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 28 Drugs, police corruption and human trafficking ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������ 30 Illicit trade shifts to Mizoram ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 31 Focus on Myanmar: a regional conundrum................................................................................................................ 33 Notes ������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� 36 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY he remote and isolated north-eastern region of India is a classic example of a forgotten frontier (Figure 1). Lying adjacent to Myanmar, it is an insurgency- Tridden area with a vibrant smuggling economy that connects South Asia with South East Asia. It is also a zone of military and geopolitical contestation between New Delhi and Beijing. Consisting of seven provinces, the region is only connected to the Indian heartland through an extremely narrow strip of territory: the so-called Siliguri Corridor, a 22 kilometre-wide slice of Indian land between Nepal and Bangladesh.1 The ‘Northeast’ (as it is known in India) is one of the focuses of the current military tension between India and China along the length of their shared boundary from the Pakistan trijunction in the north to the Myanmar trijunction in the east. If a major war breaks out, China will almost certainly seek to attack and occupy Arunachal Pradesh (Figure 1), the northernmost province in the region which has been controlled by India since the 1880s (when it fell within the domain of the British Raj).2 China sees India’s possession of Arunachal Pradesh as ‘illegal’ due to it having been a colonial inheritance.3 Beijing refers to the province as ‘South Tibet’ and argues that as present-day Tibet itself is a part of China, any territories that were once a part of Tibet are also part of China. This argument hinges on whether Tibet can be considered a historically Chinese territory or one that was previously independent but subsequently occupied by China. The present boundary between India and China in the Arunachal Pradesh region, known as the McMahon Line, was delineated by the British in 1914 when Tibet was a de facto independent state due to the collapse of central rule in China in the preceding two years. For this reason, the line is roundly rejected by Beijing. Far to the north, in the territory of the former kingdom of Jammu and Kashmir, the situation is reversed. Here, it is India that claims territory that China physically controls.4 India argues that Chinese troops occupied a large portion of the former kingdom by stealth in the 1950s, when New Delhi was fixated on combating Pakistani irredentism elsewhere. It was in this area, facing Tibet, that in June 2020, Indian and Myanmar soldiers on patrol. The Northeast is rife with tension between India and China, with each country seeking to counter the other’s influence in a larger geopolitical rivalry. © STR/AFP via Getty Images EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 1 Chinese troops clashed for the first time in 45 years. to reach other markets and become a pan-Asian Twenty Indian soldiers died, along with an unknown economic power. Cut off from West and Central number of Chinese. While the boundary dispute in Asian markets by Pakistan and unable to improve the north is more about physical control and less relations with China as long as the boundary dispute about historical legitimacy, it is no less sensitive than festers, New Delhi is looking east towards the the dispute in Arunachal Pradesh. Losing ground in Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) as the north could crucially weaken the Indian military a trading partner. Myanmar is a land bridge between posture vis-à-vis Pakistan, which has long courted India’s Northeast and ASEAN, and its balancing role China as a counterweight to India. between Indian and Chinese strategic ambitions For New Delhi, the Northeast also presents internal makes it a partner that both wish to court. problems, being host to multiple insurgencies. Some With these geopolitical dynamics in play, it is of these are believed to receive covert support perhaps unsurprising that allegations of covert 5 from Chinese intelligence. Although such support intrigues are still levelled. New Delhi suspects that is nowhere near the scale that Pakistan provides to Beijing is secretly arming the Arakan Army, a rebel jihadist organizations operating in Kashmir, it is still group in Myanmar that, among other activities, a low-burning source of worry for Indian security is targeting Indian infrastructure projects in the planners. country.6 For its part, Delhi has been discreetly But the Northeast also represents a vital economic providing military equipment to the Myanmar opportunity for India, because, along with India’s government for several years in a bid to counter peninsular coastline, it offers a route for the country Chinese influence.7 TAJIKISTAN AFGHANISTAN Xinjiang Area ceded by Pakistan to China, claimed by India Pakistan- administered Kashmir Area held by China, Daulat claimed by India B Oldi CHINA Jammu & Ladakh Qinghai ILMBAD Kashmir Demchok Durand line, not recognized by Tibet Afghanistan PAKISTAN McMahon line NE ELHI Doklam Arunachal Pradesh NEPAL N L THIMH KATHMN BHUTAN International boundary Largely claimed by China Disputed boundary State boundary INDIA BANGLADESH Area held/claimed HAKA MYANMAR Capital/town/village Mandalay FIGURE 1 Disputed frontiers in South Asia. NOTE: The territories of the former kingdom of Jammu and Kashmir, which are currently under Pakistani and Chinese control, are claimed by India. The province of Arunachal Pradesh is the northernmost and easternmost province in the Northeast, bordering China directly. China claims about 90% of this province. 2 TRAFFICKINGCROSSING THE MALAGASY LINE TORTOISES Although India announced its ‘Look East’ policy in 1992 control, increases in cross-border trade between India in an attempt to search for new markets that would lie and Myanmar might only strengthen local politico- outside the stranglehold of hostile neighbouring states, criminal interests
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